What Can I Do to Bring Safe Drinking Water to Others?

March 25, 2011 Greg Hitchcock

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clean water, conserving water, lifestyle changes, Uncategorized, using less water

The worldwide water crisis seems so daunting. While Water for Humans and many other like-minded organizations are doing what they can to heighten awareness and bring useful information to people that helps them address the clean water crisis, this is a problem that affects billions of people on a global scale.

In the Developing World, most people do not have running water.
2.5 Billion people do not have access to a toilet or a latrine.
Diarrhea kills more than 4,000 children each day, AND 90% of them these children are under 5 years old. Water.org estimates that diarrhea kills more young children than AIDS, malaria and measles combined.

But each one of us can change our personal lifestyle habits in subtle, easy ways that can free up enormous amounts of water. Examples include —

Taking a 4 -minute shower. (The average American takes at least an 8-minute shower and uses 20 gallons of water, four times as much water as someone in the developing world uses all day.)

Find out if your home has a water leak. Check your water meter. Then wait two hours without using any water. Then check the meter again. If the reading changes, you’ve got a leak. (According to the EPA, water leaks in U.S. homes account for more than 1 trillion wasted gallons per year.)

Turn off the water facet when you are brushing your teeth. (According to the EPA’s WaterSense program, the average bathroom faucet flows at a rate of 2 gallons per minute. So, a single person can save an average of 8 gallons of water each day by simply turning off the faucet when they brush their teeth.)

Take more showers and fewer baths. (A full bath can take 70 gallons to fill, according to the EPA, while a 5-minute shower will only wash away anywhere from 10 to 25 gallons.

Learn about easy, every-day ways you can save water. Visit http://tinyurl.com/6zuqoso and see what simple changes you can make to conserve our planet’s most precious resource.

Then, when you watch stories on the news about people whose lives are ravaged by unsanitary water, you can feel good that you are doing something to help alleviate this worldwide crisis. Join Water for Humans to address this humanitarian initiative that will save lives. Thank you!